Asked by: Baroness Coffey (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government what plans they have to publish the locations of (1) the coronation woods, (2) the projects of the coronation living heritage fund, and (3) the micro-woods.
Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Forestry Commission publishes statistics on new planting of woodland, and trees outside woodland, in England, in the Forestry Commission Key Performance Indicators (copy attached). They plan to publish related geospatial data by the end of 2026-27 on the locations of the new planting wherever considerations such as data quality and data licencing enable this.
Asked by: Baroness Coffey (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government how much funding was spent on micro-woods between 2024 and 2026.
Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Defra supported a number of tree planting delivery partners between 2024 and 2026. These partners delivered a range of tree planting. This includes the Coronation Living Heritage Fund. This Fund spent £1.1 million on Miyawaki (micro wood) projects. The funding was distributed to local authority delivery partners in November 2023. The planting of these projects took place between November 2023 and March 2026.
Asked by: Baroness Coffey (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government what estimate they have made of the number of trees planted through the coronation living heritage funds.
Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Forestry Commission publishes statistics on new planting of woodland, and trees outside woodland, in England. The requested information is available at GOV.UK: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/forestry-commission-corporate-plan-performance-indicators. These statistics are reported annually for each financial year with interim updates where data are available after mid-year. The Coronation Living Heritage Fund ran from August to September 2023, with planting taking place between November 2023 and March 2026. The planting figures are:
New planting of trees outside woodland
Financial year | Approximate area equivalent (hectares) | Number of individual trees newly planted (number) |
2025-26 | 3 | 2,000 |
2024-25 | 16 | 13,000 |
2023-24 | 18 | 14,000 |
Total | 37 | 29,000 |
Asked by: Baroness Coffey (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government why the Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government drafted and tabled the Environmental Delivery Plans (Appropriate Prioritisation) Regulations 2026 (SI 2026/655) when Baroness Hayman of Ullock made a commitment to the House on 17 September 2025 (HL Deb col 2331) that the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs would take the lead on Environmental Delivery Plans.
Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government is responsible for the enabling powers under which the Environmental Delivery Plans (Appropriate Prioritisation) Regulations 2026 were made and therefore took the lead in bringing forward the regulations. The regulations were developed in close collaboration with the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and Natural England, reflecting the shared responsibility for implementation of the Nature Restoration Fund and Environmental Delivery Plans.
Asked by: Baroness Coffey (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government which peers were invited to the meetings to discuss (1) the draft Nature Restoration Levy Regulations 2026, and (2) the Environmental Delivery Plans (Appropriate Prioritisation) Regulations 2026, described in paragraph 44 of the 8th Report of Session 2026–27 of the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee
Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Lord Krebs and Baroness Willis of Summertown were invited to discuss the draft Nature Restoration Levy Regulations 2026 and the Environmental Delivery Plans (Appropriate Prioritisation) Regulations 2026. The invitation reflected their previous engagement on the Nature Restoration Fund during passage of the Planning and Infrastructure Act 2025 and their expressed interest in the development of the related secondary legislation.
Asked by: Baroness Coffey (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government which Secretary of State will publish statutory guidance on the Nature Restoration Fund, and when.
Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Secretary of State for Defra will publish guidance on the Nature Restoration Fund so that it is in place for when the first Environmental Delivery Plan becomes available for developers. Defra will keep the need for further areas of guidance under review.
Asked by: Baroness Coffey (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government what estimate they have made of the number of misconnections to the sewerage system for (1) homes, and (2) schools.
Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
In 2019 around 150,000 to 500,000 homes in the UK were estimated to have drain misconnections. Defra does not have numbers of misconnections for schools.
Property owners are legally responsible for resolving misconnected pipework on their property; public misconnections are the responsibility of water companies.
Should misconnections not be resolved, the responsible party can be prosecuted; in some cases, local authorities and water companies can access private property to fix misconnections and then recover their costs from the owner.
Asked by: Baroness Coffey (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government how many sustainable farming incentive grants were awarded in 2025 (1) in total, and (2) that were of a value greater than £100,000.
Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Between January 2025 to December 2025, there were 45,295 Sustainable Farming Incentive Agreements. 863 of these agreements had an annual value of over £100,000, which is 1.91% of the overall agreements.
Asked by: Baroness Coffey (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government why the Rural Payments Agency is not able to process applications from commons land applicants through either an electronic process or a paper-based process.
Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Rural Payments Agency (RPA) recognises the importance of providing common landholders access to farming schemes.
Current systems do not yet allow common landholders to access schemes, but work is under way to address these issues, working with stakeholders.
Asked by: Baroness Coffey (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they will publish the list of councils which have not yet finalised their local nature recovery strategies.
Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
This Government has published a map [see attached], which is updated regularly, to show the areas covered by each Local Nature Recovery Strategy and whether or not the strategy has been published. As of 22 May 2026, 38 strategies have been published with the remaining 10 strategies expected soon. The areas yet to publish their strategies are: